Tag: IIS

In this post, we will discuss about the new setting ‘Idle Timeout Action’ introduced with IIS 8.5 web server. Before I start discussing usage of ‘Idle Timeout Action’. I would like to tell what the Idle Timeout is.

IIS provides the administrator with an option of timing out a worker process that is idle for a specified period of time. This is a good option for sites that are not accessed very often because it frees up system resources when the site is idle. The disadvantage is that the next time the site is accessed, the user will need to wait for the worker process to start again.

With IIS 8.5, it provides an option of suspending an idle worker process than terminating it. A suspended worker process remains alive but is paged-out to disk, reducing the system resources it consumes. When a user accesses the site again, the worker process wakes up from suspension and is quickly available. When an idle worker process is terminated, the worker process is shut down and the startup period will be longer when the site is subsequently accessed. The default behavior is to terminate the idle worker process, and the same behavior is used in the previous versions of IIS.

This setting can be changed at the application pool level. But how to check which application pool is being used by the website.

Increasing logging verbosity at the connector level can be helpful in quick problem identification and resolution as it can pinpoint where the problem is, when an external web server is being used with Adobe ColdFusion.

ColdFusion 10 and 11 supports IIS and Apache web server. I will show how to enable verbose logging on both web servers.

When we configure connector with an external web server. ColdFusion creates configuration file and store them at <cf_install_root>/config/wsconfig/<Magic Number>.

IIS

To enable verbose logging at IIS level,

Set log_level property value from info to debug, in the isapi_redirect.properties file located at <cf_install_root>/config/wsconfig/<Magic Number>.

Restart web server for changes to take effect.

Now, It should start logging verbose information about each and every request served over connector in log file named isapi_redirect.log available in the same configuration directory.

If you have more than one website configured with ColdFusion, each website has its own numbered directory available at <cf_install_root>/config/wsconfig/. You should make the changes only in the intended website.

To ensure the configuration directory for specific website, navigate to IIS Manager > Sites > {Site Name} > Jakarta virtual directory. Right click on jakarta virtual directory and click on explore, it will open connector configuration directory for that specific website.

Apache

To enable verbose logging at Apache level,

Set JkLogLevel property value from info to debug, in the mod_jk.conf file located at <cf_install_root>/config/wsconfig/<Magic Number>.

Restart web server for changes to take effect.

For Apache, it logs verbose information into a log file named mod_jk.log available in the same configuration directory.

Important Notes:

In production environment, verbose logging should not be enable for long span of time as it logs very detailed information which may lead to high memory consumption and it also impacts performance.

Before making any changes, you need to ensure you are making changes to the intended connector configuration file.